Propaganda in China

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Propaganda in the People's Republic of China refers to the PRC's use of propaganda to skew public and international opinion in favor of its policies.[1][2][3] Domestically, this includes censorship of proscribed views and an active cultivation of views that favor the government. Propaganda is considered central to the operation of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its hold on power.[1] [4][1] In 2005, Reporters Sans Frontières published a report about the Chinese, CCP-controlled, news agency Xinhua calling it "the world's biggest propaganda agency".[5]

Mao-era China is known for its constant use of mass campaigns to legitimatize the state and the policies of leaders. It was the first Chinese government to successfully make use of modern mass propaganda techniques, adapting them for use in a country which had a largely rural and illiterate population.[4] Kurlantzick and Link state that the top priority of the CCP has been and remains "maintaining absolute political power,"[1] and that propaganda is directed towards this end.[1]

History

Aspects of propaganda can be traced back to the earliest period of Chinese history, but propaganda has been most effective in the twentieth century owing to mass media and an authoritarian government.[4]

The origins of the CCP's propaganda system can be traced to the Yan'an Rectification Movement[6] following which it became a key mechanism in the Party's campaigns.[7][3] The propaganda system, considered a central part of CCP’s “control system”[3][8], drew much from Soviet, Nazi and other totalitarian states’ propaganda methods,[3][9] representing a quintessential Leninist “transmission belt” for indoctrination and mass mobilization.[10][11][3]

Propaganda and indoctrination are considered to have been a hallmark of the Maoist state[6][3][8] and Mao a “master propagandist” in his own right. His regime employed a variety of “thought control” techniques, including incarceration for "brainwashing," construction of models to be emulated, mass mobilization campaigns, the creation of study groups and ideological monitors throughout society, promulgation of articles to be memorized, control of the educational system, a nationwide system of loudspeakers that reached into every village, control of and propaganda through media, and creation of propaganda teams to indoctrinate segments of the population, among other methods.[3]

Propaganda in China during the Maoist era, while ostensibly aspiring to a "Communist utopia," often had a negative focus on constantly searching for enemies among the people. The means of persuasion was often extremely violent, "a literal acting out of class struggle."[12]

CCP propaganda and thought work traditionally had a much broader notion of the public sphere than is usually defined by media specialists, according to Brady.[12] Chinese propagandists used every possible means of communication available in China after 1949, including electronic, such as film, radio, television, public address systems; education, including curriculum, scholarly research, and book publising; print media, such as newspapers, cartoon books, wall newspaper, big character posters, pamphlets, slogans on the walls of buildings, etc.; culture, such as entertainment shows, cross-talk, storytelling, politicised art and music; and oral, including literacy classes, memorising Mao quotes, school and mass organisations, one-one-one thought education sessions, and political study classes in the workplace.[12]

China Central Television has traditionally served as a major national conduit for televised propaganda, while the People's Daily newspaper has served as a medium for print propaganda. During the Mao years, a distinctive feature of propaganda and thought work was "rule by editorial," according to Brady. Political campaigns would be launched through editorials and leading articles in People's Daily, which would be followed by other papers.[12] Work units and other organizational political study groups utilized these artilces as a source for political study. During the Mao years, reading newspapers in China was "a political obligation," according to Frederick Yu. Mao used Lenin's model for the media, which had it function as a tool of mass propaganda, agitation, and organization.[12]

A poster during the Criticize Lin Biao, Criticize Confucius campaign. It reads, "The criticism of Lin and Kong (Confucius) is a matter of prime importance to the country and armed forces".

Political scientists[who?] believe that propaganda in the PRC is being utilized by the CCP to nurture the development of Chinese nationalism and loyalty to the Party-state. Many also believe that the CCP, having embarked on a program of capitalist-style economic reform and modernization in the late 1970s, is keen to use propaganda to portray itself as a nationalistic and patriotic party, rather than simply as a party that builds socialism or implements Marxism-Leninism in China, since these theories have largely been abandoned and thus can no longer serve as effective bases of loyalty to the regime. Common themes in the new nationalistic propaganda of the PRC include the lionizing of the People's Liberation Army and its soldiers for their exploits and sacrifices during the 1937-1945 Second Sino-Japanese War, and the allegedly seamless unity of the nation's 56 officially recognized ethnic groups.

In previous decades, PRC propaganda was crucial to the formation and promotion of the cult of personality centered around Chairman Mao Zedong. It also served as a useful tool for mobilizing popular participation in national campaigns such as the 1958 Great Leap Forward and the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution. Following the death of Mao in 1976, propaganda was used to blacken the character of the Gang of Four, which was blamed for the excesses of the Cultural Revolution. Past propaganda also encouraged the Chinese people to emulate putatively selfless model workers and soldiers, such as the famous Comrade Lei Feng, suicidal Chinese Civil War hero Dong Cunrui, self-sacrificing Korean War hero Yang Gensi, and Dr. Norman Bethune, a Canadian doctor who assisted the Communist Eighth Route Army during the Second Sino-Japanese War. It also praised Third World revolutionaries and close foreign allies such as Albania and North Korea while vilifying both the United States "imperialists" and the Soviet "revisionists" (the latter of whom was seen as having betrayed Marxism-Leninism). One of the most famous propagandist who was supposedly sidetracked was Zhang Zhixin; her loyalty to the party as well as opposition to the ultra-left singled her out for severe punishment, yet her story provides a good example of how propaganda is delivered.

In terms of intensity and scope, spiritual control has been reinforced under the CCP's rule, and has become a basic feature of citizens' daily life, according to Victor Shaw, writing in 1996.[13] To an extent, the "freedom of silence" cherished by some older Chinese scholars was not even possible for an illiterate peasant in a remote area under the CCP mass propaganda.[13]

The CCP utilizes propaganda to spread its policies, build social consensus, and mobilize the population for social programs. Ideological tensions result in mass movements, and the resulting spiritual control legitimizes the political establishment, Shaw writes.[13] "Political studies, legal education, heroic models, and thought reform provide the CCP with effective weapons to propagandize rules and legal codes, normalize individual behaviour, and rehabilitate deviants in labor camps."[13] The central goal of CCP propaganda has been ensuring its absolute hold to power, and no other goal—be it economic, military, diplomatic, or nationalistic supersedes this aim, according to Kurlantzick and Link.[1]

Mechanics

Control of media

Media operations and content are tightly controlled,[14][15] and the Party largely determines what appears in news reports. Controlling media content allows the Communist Party to disseminate propaganda supportive of government policies, kill controversial news stories, and have reports published criticizing political adversaries, including scholars supporting democracy, advocates of religious freedom, Taiwanese nationalists, and representatives of the United States government.[14]

While in the past the CCP’s Central Propaganda Department and its local branches sent faxes to all media throughout the country with instructions indicating subjects that the media should stress or avoid entirely, directives are now imparted to ranking media managers or editors during phone conversations—a move designed to reduce the paper trail.[14] Media in China faces few restrictions on content that is not deemed to be politically damaging.[14]

Editors and reporters in China have long risked demotion, dismissal, or more serious punishment by the state when they push the limits of permissible coverage.[1] Wu Xuecan, a former editor of the People's Daily Overseas Edition, writes that the CCP's media control is "unrivaled by any totalitarian regime of the past."[16] Xuecan states that through control of the "ideological domain, material means and living necessities," editors and reporters are conditioned to keep news and reports aligned with the ruling Party's interests.[16] Further, ideological indoctrination through political study sessions ensures that editors first practice self-censorship.[16] He Qinglian writes that long years of suppression have bred in Chinese journalists a habit of "self-discipline," and that most Chinese journalists resign themselves to playing the role of "Party mouthpieces."[15] Control is also directed at sources of information: ordinary people are restricted from providing news to Chinese media, and more so to foreign media.[15]

Kurlantzick and Link state that the CCP has historically relied more on fear induced self-censorship than administrative censorship.[1] In the Mao-era and the years following, broad and vague directives such as “Criticize Confucius” or “Annihilate Bourgeois Liberalism” would be issued; violations would carry a hefty price and citizens had to monitor themselves and others, guessing at what the government might not like. A “safety in numbers” mentality kept people from asserting themselves, and anyone who dared venture outside the safe area was said to be “break[ing] into forbidden zones.”[1] The same fear-induced self-censorship continues today, with exploration into topics such as the 1989 Tiananmen Square Incident, Tibet, Falun Gong, the China Democratic Party, Taiwan Independence, Uyghur autonomy, the Great Leap famine, and corruption among top leaders being forbidden.[1][3]

The public remains aware that violation of the "forbidden zones," or actions that infringe on the interests of the ruling Party-state, is extremely dangerous. The forbidden areas are smaller in comparison with the Maoist era, the surface of society seems less affected, fear is less constant, and most people sidestep the constraints easily.[1] Behind a surface appearance of ordinariness, however, remains a "ubiquitous police state" in which the central authorities announce policy goals and leave Party officials and hired thugs to accomplish them as seen fit.[1] This results in considerable differences from place to place in the degree of coercion and the techniques employed. Individuals who "step" into a forbidden zone may initially receive a verbal correction. Escalating measures for repeat offenders include being surveilled and followed by plainclothes police, telephone and e-mail surveillance, then job-loss and blacklisting, and, if necessary, labor camp, prison, torture, and execution.[1] Citizens' awareness of these consequences explain why the system of self-censorship works and the existence of a civil society under CCP rule is impossible.[1] NGOs are almost without exception subject to CCP control, and any group whose membership grows to 10 or 20 people may be repressed.[1]

Thought work and ideological remoulding

A major tool of the CCP for inducing and ensuring public obedience to the Party is "thought work" (sixiang gongzuo).[1] Propaganda and thought work were pursued "openly, explicitly, and without apology"[1] in the Maoist era. Characteristic of it were practices of "ideological remolding" (sixiang gaizao), ideological purges, ritual humiliation of perceived enemies, political study to ensure allegiance to the Party line, and the targeting of high-profile individuals as symbols of negative tendencies to be eradicated.[12][1]

Biderman and Meyers wrote in 1968 that while some kind of thought reform is characteristic of all totalitarian regimes, the CCP "set about it more purposefully, more massively, and more intensively than have other ruling groups," including through employing known techniques in new ways. They note, as an example, the presence of daily meetings for criticism and self-criticism during the 1960s; surveillance and sanctions were connected with education to "expose, censure, and correct shortcomings of attitude and conduct." Communist leaders attacked all personal connections between soldiers that were not based on political convictions. "By these and other techniques they exploit[ed] social pressures and personal anxieties brilliantly to ensure conformity."[17] While carried out more subtly than in the Mao era, thought work remains crucial to the CCP's maintenance of power.[1] Whereas Mao-era mass mobilization campaigns attempted to transform all of society, including human nature, thought work today focuses more on a narrower range of issues critical to CCP rule.[1]

The Communist Party's thought work includes both intervention to prevent the expression of proscribed views, and an active cultivation of views that favor the government.[1] The latter aspect, which has been part of the system from the outset, has been given particular attention in recent years. This has included through textbooks, television documentaries, museums, and other media that spread "seriously distorted versions of Chinese history," according to Kurlantzick and Link.[1] The functioning of the two components--the suppression of unfavorable views and promotion of favorable ones--has a powerful impact on public opinion.[1]

Textbooks stress China’s history of humiliation (bainian guochi) at the hands of the West, while the news media simultaneously tells the public that the West wants to “keep China down” and that talk of human rights is only a tool for this purpose.[1] The public is told that Japan refuses to acknowledge its war crimes in China, and that the "wolf-hearted" Dalai Lama wants to "split the motherland."[1] What Kurlantzick and Link term this manipulation through education and media has been especially effective among young urban elites, a portion of whom are called "angry youth" (fenqing).[1] History is selectively erased from textbooks and other media, and in contemporary China it remains difficult or impossible to discuss the Mao-era in any public context. The "true history" of Tibet, Taiwan, World War II, and the CCP itself, is routinely "airbrushed" from textbooks and media, often replaced by names, dates and manipulative slogans.[1] Guidance of opinion through stimulating patriotism and identifying it with support for the CCP has gained footing.[1]

Thought work is also performed through the use of language.[1] Link and Kurlantzick state that the language the CCP employs "would be recognizable to George Orwell."[1] Putative examples include the political pressure put on an individual being called "help"; the violation of rights being described as the "protection of rights"; thought control of workers through what are labelled "labor unions"; suppressing the Uyghur population called "counterterrorism"; authoritarianism being dubbed democracy while real democracy movements are denounced as "counterrevolutionary rebellions"; and a system of servile courts hailed as the "rule of law."[1] This language draws from the concept of the "Big Lie," according to Kurlantzick and Link: the repetition of a gross falsehood, without challenge, until is accepted as truth, or something that for political purposes is just as solid as truth.[1]

The experiences of propaganda and thought work in the Cultural Revolution provided the CCP with a "profound lesson," according to Brady. Virtually all post-Mao era Party leaders had been under attack during that time, and drew two seemingly contradictory lessons: the rejection of mass movements and thought reform as means of transforming China, and the recognition of the "vital role of propaganda and thought work in China's political control." The administration of propaganda and thought work was plagued by these issues through the 1980s, and up to the events of June 4, 1989.[12]

Modernizing the propaganda apparatus

The events of April and June 1989 were an indication to many elders in the CCP that liberaliation in the propaganda sector had gone too far, and that the Party must re-establish its control over ideology and the propaganda system.[12]

Anne-Marie Brady, an Associate Professor at the University of Canterbury’s School of Political Science and Communication, writes that propaganda and thought work have become the "life blood" of the Party-State since the post-1989 period, and one of the key means for guaranteeing the CCP's continued legitimacy and hold on power.[12]

In the 1990s, propaganda theorists described the challenges to China's propaganda and thought work as "blind spots"; mass communication was advocated as the antidote. From the early 1990s, selective concepts from mass communications theory, public relations, advertising, social psychology, and other areas of modern mass persuasion were introduced into China's propaganda system for the purpose of creating a modern propaganda model.[12]

Part of the CCP's modern propaganda apparatus is "market-based censorship," in which media outlets and companies are threatened with economic repercussions, in addition to the traditional political and legal penalties, if they stray from the Party line.[1] While traditional tools of police action and prison sentences continue to be regularly used to silence internet activists, and the state’s technical capacity to censor and control online content remains unrivaled, CCP has been at the forefront of a growing trend toward “outsourcing” censorship and monitoring to private companies.[1] Enterprises, including Internet portals and blog-hosting services, are required to employ in-house staff to handle censorship tasks and risk losing their business licences if they fail to comply with censorship directives.[1]

In early 2009 the CCP embarked on a multi-billion dollar global media expansion, including a 24-hour English language news channel supposed to imitate CNN. According to Nicholas Bequelin, a senior researcher at Human Rights Watch, it was part of Hu Jintao's plan to "go global" and make "the voice of China better heard in international affairs." Bequelin notes that in recent years CCTV and the People's Daily have come to look "slicker, more contemporary and less political than in the past," but that the fundamental premise is still the same: "all information on state-run channels must reflect the government's views."[18]

Spin doctors

According to Anne-Marie Brady, the Foreign Ministry first set up a system of designated officials to give information in times of crisis in 1983, and greatly expanded the system to lower levels in the mid 1990s. Previously, China's spin had been directed only at foreigners, but in the 1990s leaders realised that managing public crises was useful for domestic politics; this included setting up provincial level "News Coordinator Groups," and inviting foreign PR firms to give seminars.[12]

Brady writes that Chinese foreign propaganda officials took cues from the Blair government's spin doctoring during the "mad cow" disease crisis of 2000-2001, and the Bush government's use of the U.S. media after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. According to her, the Blair model allows for a certain amount of negative coverage to be shown during a crisis, which is believed to help release some of the "social tension" surrounding it. She believes information managers in China used this approach during coal mining disasters of 2005.[12]

According to Brady, trained official spokespeople are now available on call in every central government ministry, as well as in local governments, to deal with emerging crises; these spin doctors are coordinated and trained by the Office of Foreign Propaganda/State Council Information Office.[12]

Structure of the propaganda system

According to David Shambaugh, professor of political science and international affairs at the Elliott School of International Affairs[19] and a fellow of the Brookings Institution,[20] the CCP's propaganda system (xuanchuan xitong), extends itself, as a sprawling bureaucratic establishment, into virtually every medium concerned with the dissemination of information.[3] Shambaugh notes that according to the CCP publication Zhongguo Gongchandang jianshe dazidian.[3][21] "newspaper offices, radio stations, television stations, publishing houses, magazines, and other news and media departments; universities, middle schools, primary schools, and other vocational education, specialized education, cadre training, and other educational organs; musical troupes, theatrical troupes, film production studios, film theaters, drama theaters, clubs, and other cultural organs, literature and art troupes, and cultural amusement parks; cultural palaces, libraries, remembrance halls, exhibition halls, museums, and other cultural facilities and commemoration exhibition facilities" come under CCP's propaganda oversight. Shambaugh believes that this expansive definition implies that every conceivable medium which transmits and conveys information to the people of China falls under bureaucratic purview of the the CCP Propaganda Department (CCPPD).[3]

According to official government reports in 2003, channels of propaganda dissemination of the CCPPD included 2,262 television stations (of which 2,248 were “local”), 2,119 newspapers, 9,074 periodicals and 1,123 publishing houses,[3][22] in addition to internal circulation papers and local gazetteers, approximately 68 million internet accounts with more than 100 million users, and more than 300 million mobile phone users who fall under the system's purview.[23]

Shambaugh states that the writ of the CCPPD has remained unchanged since the Maoist era, while the mechanics of oversight and active censorship have undergone considerable evolution.[3]

Propaganda work by the CCP has been, historically, divided into two categories: directed towards Chinese people (internal or duinei) and directed towards foreigners and the outside world (external or duiwai) as well as four types: political, economic, cultural and social.[2] The Central Propaganda Department oversees internal propaganda, and, the closely linked bureaucracy, The Office of Foreign Propaganda matters relating to external propaganda.[2]

The Central Propaganda Department is a highly secretive office with its address and contact details classified, and it is only indirectly represented online. The propaganda system, including the Central Propaganda Department, does not appear in officially published diagrams of the Chinese Bureaucratic System, whether in Chinese or in other languages.[2] [3] The Office of Foreign Propaganda while similarly secret but has a more public front under the name 'Information Office of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China.'[2]

Propaganda on the Internet

In later years the Internet played a key role in the spread of CCP propaganda to Chinese diaspora. PRC-based Internet sites remain a leading source of Chinese language and China-related news for overseas Chinese. The Internet is an extremely effective tool for guiding and organizing overseas Chinese public opinion, according to Anne-Marie Brady.[24]

The CCP has an established bureaucracy of internet police that has been estimated in size at 30,000 or more.[1] Using sophisticated technology purchased from developed countries, filters have been set up to block commentary on sensitive topics and to expunge material with sensitive terms.[1][3][25] Use of pseudonyms is banned in cyberspace and collective-responsibility mechanisms instituted allow for entire website to be shut-down, and its operators held responsible, if errant commentary appear on its pages.[1] Techniques of control and monitoring include electronic mailboxes to which any citizen can secretly report violations,.and the use of agents-provocateurs, and hackers.[1]

Brady cites an example of the role of the Internet in organizing popular protests by overseas Chinese, its usage by the state against a purported bias of the Western media in its coverage of unrest in Tibetan areas in March 2008 and, a month later, in organizing a series of worldwide demonstrations in support of China during the Olympic torch relay.[24] "These protests and the later demonstrations were genuine and popular, which shows the effectiveness of China’s efforts to rebuild positive public opinion within the Chinese diaspora, but it should be noted that they received official support, both symbolic and practical."[24] There was no compulsion for overseas Chinese not to attend the rallies, but those who did were given free t-shirts, souvenirs, transport, and in some cases accommodation, all courtesy of local embassy officials and China-based donors. These demonstrations successfully drowned out the protests of human rights groups.[24]

Traditionally, the CCP propaganda apparatus had been based around suppressing news and information, but this often meant the Party found itself in a reactive posture, according to Chinese media expert David Bandurski.[26]

Online spin doctors

Main article: 50 Cent Party

China is known for using internet "spin doctors", specially trained internet users who comment on blogs, public forums or wikis, to shift the debate in favor of the Communist Party and influence public opinion.[26] They are sometime called the "50-cent party" - named so because they are allegedly paid 50 Chinese cents for each comment supporting the CCP they make.[27]

An internal government document released by the BBC outlines the requirements for those employed as spin-doctors, which include having "relatively good political and professional qualities, and have a pioneering and enterprising spirit", being able to react quickly, etc.[27]

It is believed that such government-sponsored Internet commentators have now become widespread and their numbers could be in the tens of thousands;[27] Bandurski suggests the number may be up to 280,000[26] while The Guardian puts the estimate as 300,000.[28] According to The Guardian, the growth in popularity of such astroturfing owes to the ease with which web 2.0 technologies such as Twitter, Wikipedia and YouTube can be employed to sway public opinion. The BBC reports that special centres have been set up to train China's 'army of internet spin doctors'.[27]

External propaganda

The Chinese state refers to all media work abroad as wai xuan, or "external propaganda."[18] According to Brady, China sees the Cold War as never having ended. According to strictly classified materials she was able to obtain, China sees itself as facing a hostile Western world that constantly seeks to undermine it.[12] The CCP's foreign propaganda activities are therefore an important means of combating and managing this "foreign enmity." Since 1989, a nadir for China's propagandists, CCP propaganda officials have worked hard to rebuild China's international image, bringing in new technologies and methodologies, and at the same time retaining a few "tried and true methods from the past."[12]

In a 2008 report, the U.S. State Department’s International Security Advisory Board declared that China was in the midst of a "comprehensive strategic deception campaign," which was said to include "Psychological Warfare (propaganda, deception, and coercion), Media Warfare (manipulation of public opinion domestically and internationally), and Legal Warfare (use of ‘legal regimes’ to handicap the opponent in fields favorable to him)."[29]

On its official Chinese Web site, CCTV describes itself as "the mouthpiece of the Party and the government," and lists its main operations under the heading "propaganda situation," referring to new foreign language channels as "reaching a new stage in external propaganda."[18]

Propaganda in the arts

In the realm of the arts, the theory of socialist realism that was adopted by the USSR and the PRC of Mao Zedong explicitly states as its goal the education of the people in the objectives and the meaning of the ideology of communism. One of the official goals of the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution in the PRC was "to transform literature and art."

Famous propaganda works

Films

Songs

Propaganda songs and music have a long and storied history in the PRC and also in Nepal and Pakistan, and they figured prominently in the popular culture of the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. Many of these songs were collected and performed as modern rock adaptations for several albums that were released during the 1990s, including "Red Rock" and "Red Sun: Mao Zedong Praise Songs New Revolutionary Medley". The latter sold 6-10 million copies in China.[30] Most of the older songs praise Mao, the CCP, the 1949 revolution, the Chinese Red Army and the People's Liberation Army, the unity of the ethnic groups of China, and the various ethnic groups' devotion to Mao and the CCP.

The titles of some of the more well-known propaganda songs are as follows:

  • "Nanniwan" (a 1943 revolutionary song)
  • "The East is Red" (the de facto national anthem of the PRC during the Cultural Revolution)
  • "Socialism is Good", a modern rock adaptation of which was performed by Zhang Qu and featured on the 1990s album Red Rock.
  • "Song of the People's Liberation Army" (中国解放軍军歌)–
  • "Battle Hymn of the Chinese People's Volunteers" (中国人民志愿军战歌)–a well-known song from the Korean War period
  • "Red Sun Shining Over the Border" (紅太陽照邊疆)–a song from the Yanbian in Jilin
  • "A Wa People Sing New Songs" (阿佤唱新歌曲)–a song attributed to the Wa ethnic minority of Yunnan
  • "Laundry Song" (洗衣歌)–a song celebrating the liberation of Tibet
  • "Liuyang River" (浏阳河)–a song about a river near Mao Zedong's hometown of Shaoshan in Hunan
  • "Saliha Most Obeys Chairman Mao" (薩利哈最聽毛主席的話)–a song attributed to the Kazakh minority of the Xinjiang
  • "The Never-Setting Sun Rises Over the Grassland" (草原上升起不落的太陽–from Inner Mongolia
  • "Xinjiang is Good" (新疆好)–attributed to the ethnic Uyghurs of Xinjiang
  • "I Love Beijing Tiananmen" (我爱北京天安门)–claimed to have been translated into over 50 languages, this song is frequently taught to schoolchildren in the PRC
  • "Zhuang Brocade Dedicated to Chairman Mao" (莊錦獻給毛主席)–a song attributed to the Zhuang ethnic minority of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region
  • "Sweet-Scented Osmanthus Blooms With the Arrival of Happiness" (attributed to the Miao, or Chinese Hmong, ethnic minority group)
  • "Generations Remember Chairman Mao's Kindness" (a song celebrating the "liberation" of the ethnic Xibe people)
  • "Salaam Chairman Mao" (薩拉姆毛主席)–a Xinjiang song praising Mao, a modern version of which was performed by Chinese rock singer Dao Lang
  • "Song of Mount Erlangshan" (歌唱二郎山)–a 1950s song celebrating the development of Tibet, which made Mount Erlangshan in western Sichuan famous
  • "Story of the Spring" (春天的故事)–a song performed by Dong Wenhua, initially at the 1997 CCTV New Year's Gala, days before his death, dedicated to late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping
  • "The Cultural Revolution is Just Great" (无产阶级文化大革命就是好)–a song praising the Cultural Revolution
  • "On the Golden Mountains of Beijing" (北京的金山上)–a song attributed to the Tibetan people praising Mao as the shining sun
  • "Sing a Song of Praise to the Motherland" (歌唱祖国)–This general patriotic song continues to be sung at national and regional celebrations and galas.

Most of the songs listed above are no longer used as propaganda by the CCP, but are exhibited in mainland China as a means of reviving popular nostalgia for the "old times" and sentiments of nationalism.

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac ad ae af ag ah ai aj ak al am Kurlantzick, Joshua (2009). "China: Resilient, Sophisticated Authoritarianism". Freedom House. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  2. ^ a b c d e Brady, Anne-Marie (2006). "Guiding Hand: The Role of the CCP Central Propaganda Department in the Current Era". Westminster Papers in Communication and Culture. 1 (3): 58–77.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Shambaugh, David (Jan 2007). "China's Propaganda System: Institutions, Processes and Efficacy". China Journal (57): 25–58.
  4. ^ a b c Mitter, Rana (2003). Nicholas J. Cull, David Colbert, and David Welch (ed.). Entry on "China" in Propaganda and Mass Persuasion: A Historical Encyclopedia, 1500 to the Present. ABC-ClIO. pp. 73–77.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: editors list (link)
  5. ^ http://www.rsf.org/Xinhua-the-world-s-biggest.html
  6. ^ a b Teiwes, Frederick C. (1993). "1,2". Politics and Purges in China (2nd ed.). Armonk: M. E. Sharpe.
  7. ^ Solomon, Richard (1971). Mao’s Revolution and the Chinese Political Culture. Berkeley: University of California Press.
  8. ^ a b Schurmann, Franz (1966). Ideology and Organization in Communist China. Berkeley: University of California Press.
  9. ^ Welch, David (1993). The Third Reich: Politics and Propaganda. New York: Routledge.
  10. ^ Inkeles, Alex (1950). Public Opinion in Soviet Russia: A Study in Mass Persuasion. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
  11. ^ Kenez, Peter (1985). The Birth of the Propaganda State: Soviet Methods of Mass Mobilization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  12. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p. 39 Cite error: The named reference "brady08" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
  13. ^ a b c d Shaw, Victor N. "Social control in China: a study of Chinese work units", Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1996.
  14. ^ a b c d Esarey, Ashley (July 31, 2007). ""Access to Information in the People's Republic of China" presented before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  15. ^ a b c Qinglian, He (2004). "Media Control in China". Human Rights in China. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  16. ^ a b c Xuecan, Wu. "Turning Everyone into a Censor: The Chinese Communist Party's All- Directional Control over the Media". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  17. ^ Meyers, Samuel M. and Albert D Biderman. Mass behaviour in battle and captivity: The communist soldier in the Korean war. (1968), Chicago University Press. p.99
  18. ^ a b c Bequelin, Nicholas. "China's New Propaganda Machine", The Wall Street Journal
  19. ^ David Shambaugh Elliott School of International Affairs
  20. ^ David Shambaugh Brookings Institution
  21. ^ Zhongguo Gongchandang jianshe dazidian 1921–1991 (An Encyclopedia on the Building of the CCP). Chengdu: Sichuan Renmin Chubanshe, 1992. p. 676.
  22. ^ National Bureau of Statistics of China, China Statistical Yearbook 2004. Beijing: China Statistics Press, 2004. pp. 844–46, 853.
  23. ^ Qiang, Xiao (14 April 2005). ""Prepared Statement" for hearings on "China's State Control Mechanisms and Methods", convened by the US–China Economic and Security Review Commission": 83. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  24. ^ a b c d Brady, Anne-Marie China’s Propaganda and Perception Management Efforts, Its Intelligence Activities that Target the United States, and the Resulting Impacts on U.S. National Security, U.S.-China Economic & Security Review Commission, April 30, 2009
  25. ^ Palfrey, John G. "Jr., Executive Director of Berkman Center for Internet and Society, "Prepared Statement" and testimony, US–China Economic and Security Review Commission". Harvard Law School. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  26. ^ a b c Bandurski, David. "China's Guerrilla War for the Web," Far Eastern Economic Review, July2008
  27. ^ a b c d Bristow, Michael. "China's internet 'spin doctors'". BBC NEWS. Retrieved 11 February 2010.
  28. ^ Fareed, Malik (Monday 22 September 2008). "China joins a turf war". The Guardian. Retrieved 24 February 2010. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  29. ^ Anderson, Dr. Eric C. and Jeffrey G. Engstrom. "China’s Use of Perception Management and Strategic Deception", Science Applications International Corporation, prepared for the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission November 2009
  30. ^ Rethinking Cultural Revolution Culture, Audio-Visual Accompaniment to the Exhibit: "Picturing Power: Art and Propaganda in the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) A Multi-Media Exhibition Held at Universitätsmuseum Heidelberg, 31.1.-28.2.2001

Related Material

  • Min, Anchee, Duo, Duo, Landsberger, Stefan R., Chinese Propaganda Posters, 245 x 370 mm, 320 pp., ISBN 3-8228-2619-7 (softcover)
  • Wolf, Michael Chinese Propaganda Posters: From the Collection of Michael Wolf, 2003, ISBN 3-8228-2619-7
  • Harriet Evans, Stephanie Donald (eds.), Picturing Power in the People's Republic of China, ISBN 0-8476-9511-5
  • Stefan Landsberger, Chinese Propaganda Posters: From Revolution to Reform, ISBN 90-5496-009-4
  • Hunter, Edward. Brain-washing in Red China: the calculated destruction of men's minds. New York, N.Y., USA.: Vanguard Press, 1951, 1953,
  • Lincoln Cushing and Ann Tompkins, Chinese Posters: Art from the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, San Francisco, CA : Chronicle Books, 2007, ISBN 978-0-8118-5946-2


External links

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